Re: A modern DBA is mentored by a database.
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 2009 19:44:35 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <8f7a6eb8-5947-4c11-95b9-39b426c16a4e_at_q7g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>
On Sep 2, 5:58 am, Helma <helma.vi..._at_hotmail.com> wrote:
> Quote:
>
> Oracle continued its focus on improving productivity for database
> administrators in Release 2, according to Townsend, by adding a new
> compression "advisor" that tells people how much storage they can
> save, along with a new high-availability "advisor" that offers
> guidance on how to squeeze out the best performance and reliability.
>
> "These [advisors] we have been adding the last few years change the
> relationship between the DB and the DBA somewhat," Townsend said. "For
> more modern DBAs, the DB is the mentor in the relationship."
>
> Unquote.
>
> what?
>
> "For more modern DBAs, the DB is the mentor in the relationship."
>
> What would his definition of a 'more modern DBA' be?
Who knows. Most of their marketing has been crap historically. I'm sure Mark is a good guy (Joel's comment), but I honestly think they are digging a grave.
Let's face it. Oracle has been trying to put DBA's put out of work for years. Yeah, I have heard the arguments about dinsoaurs who script and aren't willing to keep up with the times, and the modern DBA who spends (or at least wants to spend) his/her time "exploring new features" (whatever that means) etc. I don't buy it. Just last week, Grid's segment advisor tool (10.2.0.4) showed me a tablespace that was 150GB in size out of which I could reclaim 750GB...huh?! This is what I am going to run mission critical monitoring on in my self managing database that is "mentoring me?" LOL!
The only way Oracle can justify $47.5K US per processor (yes, I know most people don't pay sticker price) is to make the hardware and support look cheap. So they say run it on commodity hardware, and shortly, it will run itself without any support.
Their maintenance costs become more of a joke every year. Four out of five SR's I open end up being a complete waste of time. I can count on one hand (literally) the number of quality support analysts I have had in the last three years. Several SR's have involved me hand holding the support analyst to a resolution.
So what does Oracle do? Raise prices and alienate the one group that would "fight" management for them...the DBA's.
In my organization, we are getting more and more questions about open source databases (and starting some small implementations). I don't know about other posters on this board, but I am fairly well respected in my organization and my opinion carries at least some weight. They really need to stop alienating their "out in the war zone" support, and start looking at their pricing model rather than trying to remove support struts from the bridge to reduce cost.
I love Oracle database software, but if they don't change stuff really fast, I honestly think they will go the way of any number of also-rans in about ten to 15 years (if that long).
And no, I haven't had a bad day, I just felt like getting it off my chest :)
IMHO, Steve Received on Wed Sep 02 2009 - 21:44:35 CDT